A Midnight special tonight at The Gig

Growing up in Kirbyville, Eric Middleton probably didn’t plan on joining a band while floating down the Guadalupe River during his college years and then finding himself returning to Southeast Texas to perform on Crockett Street.

Well, that’s kind of how it happened.

Middleton is the lead singer and guitarist for Midnight River Choir, a folksy, country-meets-Gavin DeGraw combo that will perform at The Gig Saturday.

The band has a standing date at one long-standing Beaumont venue, but it’s a sort of “Where’s Fluffy?” kind of situation. You already all have to be apart of the following to know when they’re in town and where at.

And my lips are sealed.

In other news, the story of the band’s creation is idyllic, sincere and vaguely reminds me of the honest lyrics of Edward Sharpe.

Interpret for yourself.

Q. Tell me about the making of Midnight River Choir.
A. I met Justin, our lead guitar player, doing the happy hour thing at Cheatam Street in San Marcos and I had known Mitchell, the drummer for a while. He worked at the Lone Star Float House on the river in New Braunfels.

We got together and tried to start a band. It was during the company party where we had 27 of us on a midnight float, singing songs and going down the river at midnight. A guy came in to eat breakfast the next morning and said he was wakened by “midnight river choir.”

Q. So when did this random guy give your not-fully formed band a name?
A. That was it. We had a band and now we had a name and took it from there. This was the end of summer 2008.

Q. Wow. So you haven’t been together that long and have already released some albums, right?
A. We released one in May of 2009 and we just released our second one in August of this year. We recorded at Yellow Dog Studios in Austin and got to work with Adam Odor, a Grammy-winning sound engineer. It’s not a long window and you can tell by the sound of the first one that we were rushing.

The sound quality isn’t great, but every band doesn’t like their first record. I love the songs that are on the first one but the quality and the recording of it isn’t very good.

Q. Do you think you might re-record any of those songs?
A. We’re thinking about it but not all of the songs and making a sort of live record. With that first CD, we wanted to have a product to show off at the shows and we went for it.

Q. Since the first album was recorded not even a year after you got together, how did you get those songs together so fast?
A. The songs for the first record were previously written by myself and another bandmate and a couple were written by all of us. With the new record, there was a lot of group creation and that was better because we had a lot of time to think about it and plan for it and write for it. A few fans came in to write with us and record their songs.

Q. So coming from Kirbyville, were you at all influenced by the musically-inclined area we live in?
A. I did what they call the Texas Country Music Show in Kirbyville. It’s once a month and it’s a group of ole guys who play really good music and bring in dozens of people a month. They learn two or three songs.

That was a big part of inspiration and getting to watch and sing along with those guys. Amber, my older sister, is probably the reason I’m doing it. She sings way better than I do.

Q. What has been the coolest experience so far for you?
A. For me, the coolest part was meeting Cross Canadian Ragweed. I have always been a really big fan of Cross Canadian Ragweed and the lead singer’s wife is now our manager and we’re really close. It went from being a big fan to a really good friend. That’s an awesome experience.